Dislocados Interview

By Mafe Ferrara

I know that you have been together for a few years, how many?

Dislocados started as a band in November 2005, but then we were called the Kiev Salsa Kings. So, that makes four and a half years together, but more like three years officially as “Dislocados”. (Dislocados was a name to baptize a new direction and discipline in the band, but is supposed to suggest that we’re playing music that has absolutely nothing to do with our ethnic or national roots.)

How did you guys meet and started to play together?

The Kiev Salsa Kings started as Ukraine’s young and most promising jazz musicians got together and wanted to start doing something different than everyone else. They wanted to learn a new kind of music and rhythms that weren’t being played in Ukraine (or a lot of Eastern Europe, for that matter) until that day. The music was kind of a mix between latin jazz and Cuban music.

The band had different members then – only the bandleader, Ilya Yeresko, and first trumpet, Dennis Adu, were part of the original band. As the band started to develop, different people started coming in and out. When we decided to really make it an actual salsa band, started composing our own music, and started really studying the great songs and history of salsa clasica, that’s when we started coming together as a band and found the right members for the group we have now. We got two lead singers, solidified our rhythm and horn section, and started to concentrate on really making our own music at the same time as dedicating all of our time to bettering ourselves as a band, especially against the difficulties of having absolutely nobody in the country that can teach us the real ways of salsa. It is this dedication to learning the craft and discipline of salsa that is at the core of all the current band members and what brings us together.

Dislocados is 11 people correct? How did everybody get to be where they are in the band today?

Dislocados is actually now ten people. Ilya Yeresko, the bandleader, composer, arranger, and piano player, started with the beginning of the band and is really the visionary of Dislocados. He drives the band’s studies, discipline, learning, and direction of new music. His creative style of playing is very hard salsa and makes for great solos, while his compositions try to stay true to salsa but have this kind of dark brilliance that can only come out of Ilya’s crazy mind. His love of New York and Puerto Rican music is a daily discovery for him, and something he tries to put into the discipline of his band and music.

I (Karolina Patocki), am a bit of a different story. The only non- Ukrainian member of the band (I’m Polish-Canadian), I met Ilya and the guys in 2006 and Ilya and I talked about what the new directions could be for the band. Lesya and I started singing lead, and Ilya and I started making music together (since I write the lyrics for our original songs). After we shared our visions for the band, we knew we could create something great under his leadership that is unprecedented in Eastern Europe. Now he’s taught me a lot about salsa and to discover my unique voice, and I’m inspired to create a new salsa order where women don’t only sing about flowers and love, but also the “real” lyrics of salsa dura, just like men. Which is why we focus attention on the musicians of the band and that gender is not important here as much as the unit of the salsa band created by each individual musician’s contribution to the whole.

Olesya (Lesya) Zdorovetskaya is the other lead singer of the band, and she also records guiro and maracas on most of the tracks.

She comes from a jazz background as well, but really found her calling in salsa. She started lead singing the same time as I did, around the time we became “Dislocados”, and adds a real flare to the band. Her voice is dark and her spirit is bright. I like to think we make a great team because we’re opposites in so many ways, and therefore can deliver different things to the audiences and complete the vocals as a whole together.

She’s my partner in crime and a great front- lady, and holds down the fort as the main lead singer when I’m not able to join the band.

Andrey Chayka is our timbalero and he came a bit later into the band, in 2007 as well. He comes from a classical conservatory background and really discovered salsa as he was filling a need in our band to replace a former member and found his calling. He’s become obsessed with salsa ever since, and not only is he a great percussionist, but he’s one of our most dedicated members, and helps keep the band going in the right direction by his commitment to self-study and rehearsing, while he entertains us with his wild solos.

Alexandr Ivlyev actually started as a salsa dance teacher and came to our band just trying his hand at the bongos. He spent a lot of time in Cuba as a child, so he has this kind of connection that almost seems blood-born, despite not having actual Latin roots. Because of this, he also fits perfectly as our conga player while he filled a last-minute need of ours in the band, and now keeps the beat steady as he commits himself to turning his dance background into the link that keeps our band aware of the audience and keeps us laughing at rehearsals.

Valentin Korniyenko plays baby bass and he came into the band on a temporary basis at the beginning, but started really playing with us in 2007 permanently. He’s currently the only baby bass player in Ukraine and has a strong and deep connection and love of the double bass and jazz music.

Dennis Adu is the only other veteran member of Dislocados, having started with Ilya. He’s our first trumpet, and has a commitment to jazz deep at his core. Dennis plays in numerous jazz ensembles and has won the Dodj award for Ukraine’s Best Jazz Musician in 2009 as one of the country’s most respected jazz artists. We in Dislocados cherish him for his discipline, leadership, and the contrast between his shy personality and bold risk-taking on trumpet. His commitment to music and to his instrument inspires all of us to become better musicians after each time he plays.

Sergey Sidorenko is our second- trumpet and doubles on flugelhorn on some tracks. He joined in 2007, and has a jazz and pop background. He has played with many famous pop musicians in Ukraine and brings a great contrast to Dennis. We like to think that Dennis and Sergey compliment each other like Lesya and I do, because they really do have different flavors that makes Dislocados as a whole so much better. Sergey’s solos are always playful as is his spirit onstage.

Alexandr Charkin is our trombonist, and he is the latest member. He joined in 2008, and he contrasts our previous trombonists by having a more velvety sound that lends very well to some of the great compositions on the album. Since we played with Jimmy Bosch at the beginning of this year, he has only explored this side of himself even more, and really found a great groove on his solos, a core to any salsa dura band.

Arseniy Yandyuk came into the band as our youngest member and on kind of an informal internship program, taking the chance to learn from Ilya and the band experience by just coming to practices and learning about the beats. Also a fan of Cuba, he is currently studying at Kiev’s Glier jazz college on piano, but he is learning all about the rhythms of the band on bongo and cowbell, and since his improvement and commitment grew, he has now become a permanent member of our group, and we’re very happy to have him on our journey.

Is there a big Latin community in Ukraine? How did you guys come to love salsa so much?

Yes and no. There are several Cubans that have passed through Ukraine over the years because of former political ties, but only a few, and none of them musicians, which is why I said that we really had to learn on our own. Ilya and the guys of the Kiev Salsa Kings started experimenting, and Ilya became completely obsessed by the music and studied all he could from books, what he could find on the internet, from transcribing tracks to just learning about the composition of the music, and from youtube videos, believe it or not. (Youtube was a great revolution in Dislocados’ history.) When he met me, since I always enjoyed salsa music when I was growing up in Canada – random yet true – I think it helped kickstart a couple of songs that we could do, since

I knew all of the classics and I already spoke Spanish which helped a lot. Ilya taught himself Spanish from textbooks (which is amazing, cuz now he’s really great at it), and Lesya also started learning little by little, which was aided by memorizing songs and me walking her through it. Of course, because of creating the lyrics, learning the language was an important criteria to me of a lead singer. But, we had a couple of friends that helped us out, like this Puerto Rican guy that was working in Ukraine and gave Ilya a lot of help by teaching him about some history, passing him a lot of music, and even giving us a set of panderetas to learn about plena!

But mainly our obsession with salsa became stronger the more we played it. You have to understand that all of the musicians are among the best jazz musicians of the country, and have worked as such for many years, so the only real way to get guys like this to love the music is to play it. Once a real musician plays this music, he realizes that it’s not as easy as he thought and rich with rhythms, grooves, melodies, and improvisational opportunities like no other kind of music. Frankly, it’s the only kind of music I know where even the lead singers have the opportunity to express themselves in the entire second half of the song via rhythm, melody, and lyrics. So, either it was an instant love-at-first-sight experience like with me, Ilya, Lesya, and a few others, or it was a deeper developed love affair with the other guys while they realized that the more we play this music, the more we realize how complex it is and our respect for it grows.

The other thing that must be said, though, is that salsa music is becoming more loved in many parts of the world, from Europe to Africa to Asia. There are over 30 salsa dance schools in Kiev alone, not mentioning the rest of the country! People have really started to love this music, and we must admit it helps keep the band together as we regularly play this music four times a week. Having the first original music full salsa band in all of the countries of the former Soviet Union is a privilege and helps us keep working on a daily basis. Having said that, it’s still very difficult for us to break out and try to get people to support live music and concerts on a larger scale while European musicians, even the most famous of them, work on a daily basis to understand where their next paycheck is coming from. It’s something that we have to understand as a community that we need to support the development of the arts from a pre-school level to the professionals that give us the music that becomes the rhythm of our people.

Where do you guys get your inspiration?

As I mentioned, Ilya is most inspired by the music of New York and Puerto Rico, and what salsa dura really means. But that doesn’t mean that he hasn’t been inspired a lot by Cuba and its music. He’s taken a lot of different paths to get to where he is today, and his influences and music is constantly changing. He claims Eddie Palmieri, Thelonius Monk, Chick Corea, McCoy Tyner, Manny Oquendo, Jimmy Bosch, John Coltrane, Duke Ellington, Truco y Zaperoko, Bobby Valentin and just the cultural music of salsa, rumba, plena, and bomba, as major influences.

I speak of Ilya because he’s the one that composes the music and ultimately decides what music we play each week, but each member of the band of course has its influence on the band as a whole by the music they listen to, the type of musician they try to emulate, and their general energy they give to the band. I, for example, as a lyricist am influenced a lot by lyrics that “mean something”, because I’m not just entertained by songs that talk about dancing and love, although those are also important and fun topics. Because of that, I’m influenced by Ruben Blades, Jimmy Bosch, Tite Curet, and others that I can learn from, and yet in singing I’d add influences like Ray de la Paz, Ismael Rivera, Hector Lavoe, and Marvin Santiago (although I still have to study a lot more to sing like those greats). Lesya has other styles and takes from different musicians such as Pete el Conde Rodriguez and Frankie Vazquez, but also some similar core classics like Maelo and Cheo Feliciano. And we’re both diehard Herman Olivera fans. So, everyone has their personal influences, and while we’re trying to go more in a New York salsa dura direction, we can’t rule anything out here.

Ultimately, we all get inspired by each other while we discover this music together, which is hopefully what makes us a band and not just a bunch of musicians.

How is your music today from the day you started playing?

When we started, we had a lot to learn, and we still do, although we’ve managed to accumulate a lot of experiences along the way. We started as a band that played a bit more Latin jazz, we had some more classic Cuban songs in the mix, and then we just started learning about where to go. The obvious place to start learning from was the Hector + Willie and Ruben + Willie classics, but then we dove deeper and found much, much more. We went a little further back in the history of salsa and thought we had to start learning from the core, like Cortijo his combo, and then as we combed through the history of salsa, now we’re finding something that we can identify with in the New York salsa dura. Obviously, playing with Jimmy Bosch has helped us learn about how to go in that direction a lot more, and I think you’ll hear a lot more of that in the upcoming album that we’ll be able to release in spring 2011.

How has this affected us as a band? As we went through all of the salsa history, we just gained more knowledge of how to play as a band, and Dislocados of today differs a lot more from the beginnings because I think we’ve learned to find a better balance between our creativity and interacting with the audience, and how to leverage each others’ expertise on each instrument and creativity for the better of the band. Now we’re better structured, have better discipline, and at the same time we have more freedom of expression in the band because we understand each other more and know how to push each other towards greatness whereas I think when we started we were going in more random individual directions, as is natural at the beginning, I think. We’re more connected to what the dancer wants and can resolve that in our personality of the band. It’s a great thing when musicians and dancers start at opposite ends of the room and learn enough about each other to be able to meet in the middle and dance together as partners and celebrate this music.

Do you guys compose together? Who does what in the band?

As I mentioned before, Ilya is the creative engine of the band and writes all of the music and arrangements. I do the lyrics for the band, which are usually done before Ilya starts writing the music.

The first album was also a great process for Ilya and I to learn about each other and understand each other. Although the songs on the album are not in the order they were composed, you can hear a real difference from our first compositions to our last, because I think that Ilya and I learned what is important to each of us in the creative process, and also draw on influences from the other. In Plena Pa’ Tontos, for example, I was completely influenced by Ilya’s silliness, and he told me exactly what he wanted in lyrics. At the same time, our most serious song, Cancion de los Muertos, was a story that was very personal to me, and yet I had a clear vision of where I wanted the music to go, and I feel like Ilya really read that and delivered not only what I wanted, but exceeded expectations.

I know that you just released a preview of your single, tell us about it? Why the king of pop?

We just released Billie Jean in salsa version, and we’re very happy about it. First of all, it’s been a year since we’ve released any music, so we thought that it would be a great opportunity to release a preview of the next album with one track this year.

Secondly, we always wanted to do a cover of a non-salsa song just because it’s something so opposite to anything else we do. I’m not sure there are a lot of salsa dura remakes of great pop songs, they’re usually in romantic salsa style, so we thought that this whole process of discovering what was great about one of the greatest dance songs of all time, is a great way to train ourselves to think like a dancer, and understand their needs and wants. To connect this to salsa was the greatest challenge, but we really wanted to see if we could take the elements we love of salsa dura and yet not change the original too much to keep a good balance of both. Of course, making a tribute to Michael Jackson on the anniversary of his death, was also something that we wanted to honor such a great professional, someone that gave so much to the world and was an example to every artist.

We also knew that in doing this song, we would get a lot of criticism. And of course, there are a lot of people that don’t like it, for many different reasons. And I think that’s ok. There are also people that really love it and find something in it that they say they don’t find in many other covers of such kinds of songs. We mainly wanted to do something to get people talking and thinking and criticizing the creative process of salsa. In the end, Dislocados is experimenting and discovering different things about what makes people love music. The two things they must remember with this song are:

a)We’re not trying to be Michael Jackson. We just tried to take a great song and see how we could make it salsa dura, and yet still recognizable to MJ’s fans. We wanted to achieve a Dislocados balance of the track.

b)We are not in any way changing our direction. We’re just trying new things that help us dramatically in understanding our audiences. On the new album in 2011, you’ll be able to hear songs more like this, songs that are hardcore jazzy and complicated, and songs in between. But at least we’ll have more experience and know how to deliver more of what exactly we were intending.

Any anecdotes from a show?

Not too many, but there is one. Our first major concert was in Stockholm as Dislocados, but also backing up Huey Dunbar in a concert he had on the next night. We spent a few months learning his music, and although is different from ours, we ended up having a great time at it.

On concert night, we were all ready, the lights dimmed, the smoke machine came on, and the music started. It was a song called Con Cada Beso. Huey came from the back of the stage, and down into the front, and as he did so, the first trumpet came in with some really high notes. The stage was constructed in a few levels, and the horns and Lesya and I were at the back (as coro). As Dennis hit the highest notes, he got dizzy from all the air he needed, and actually fell backwards off of the stage about two meters, behind the curtains, and hit his head on the ground!

And the trooper Dennis is, he woke up, didn’t really know what happened, but came around, took his position and by the time it was his turn to come in again, he was ready and kept playing. It was crazy, but he was such a professional about it that none of us knew what actually happened until after the show. I think only the other horns saw it. It must have been quite a sight for anyone that caught it!

Who is your favorite salsa singer?

We already mentioned this before, so I’ll just say this. We respect, love, and learn from all salsa singers who try to stick to the roots of the music while finding their own style. We’re not huge romantic salsa fans, although we played with Huey Dunbar in Stockholm and we must say that we gained a huge respect for his music, his professionalism, and his skills as a singer. But mainly we’re diehard fans of the greats (Maelo, Cheo, Hector, etc) and are loving some of the new singers that keep that feeling alive. I think our one unanimous favorite salsa singer as a band, though, is Herman Olivera (at least of singers of today) and we’re dreaming of working with him in the future.

When and where are your upcoming shows?

Well, you can catch us every week in Kiev in the Caribbean Club on Friday and Saturday nights, if you ever make it to Ukraine.

Otherwise, in terms of bigger shows, we’re trying to arrange something in Western Europe for the fall, and we’re working on a couple of projects of bringing European bands to Kiev, and especially bringing some more greats, like the last time we brought Jimmy Bosch in January. I’m trying to work something out for Poland to maybe do some salsa legends plus Dislocados concerts, and I’m talking to a few of our heroes of salsa, but nothing is solid yet, so I’ll have to keep you guys posted.

What is next for Dislocados?

Well, like I said, we’re working on the new album for 2011. We want to create something with all of the knowledge we’ve been able to gain from the last album and from working with great people and listening to and studying more of their music. We also have an idea of some collaborations on the album with international musicians, but let’s see what we can do.

We’re working on more concerts in international places, but we really need our fans’ support in saying that they want and will pay to attend a concert where outside bands come to play in local cities, because that’s really where it will end up counting. And of course, we can’t forget Ilya’s main goal for all of us, to become better musicians and a better band as a whole, which is something we have ultimately at the core of everything we do.

(If anyone has any other ideas, we’re happy to hear them. Just write to us at dislocados@gmail.com)